Captures and Cassette Tapes
by DjDangerLove
Summary: There's a man trying to capture Rocket, but then Quill shows up. Friendship one-shot.


His heart hammers inside his chest like the thunderous sounds of cage doors being rattled by prisoners in a testing facility and if he doesn't keep the mantra of 'one foot in front of the other' in his head, he knows he'll be able to feel the desperate fingers of trapped subjects reaching out between the slits of their doors tearing at his fur as he runs to his escape past their cells.

There's a sharp pain in the bottom of his paw that steals his mantra and he stumbles into the sidewalk with a mind full of painful memories pretending to be the present. He hisses, growls, and throws curses at anyone trying to prevent his escape whether it be fellow prisoners or just jagged, discarded pieces of glass on a Xandarian walkway embedded in his foot.

"Get back here, you rodent!," a deep voice calls from behind him and Rocket scampers back to all fours with a shake of his head and a newly formed limp, but he chances a glance back over his shoulder to see a man with a sack that's going to secure nothing but Rocket's own demise. "You're mine!"

On any other day, under any other circumstances, Rocket would've let that aggressive temper of his flare with flying colors, but the past is pulling on his tail with barred teeth trying to pull him into that dark place he still doesn't understand how he got out of and all he can do is keep running, whether or not his tail gets shorter as he goes.

He turns his head back to see where he's running, surprised by the Xandarian scenery that's replaced the testing facility that his mind had shown him with realistic display only moments ago. The people are looking. They always look, but this time Rocket can't grace them with insults like he usually does. Instead, he goes with darting between their legs and lets the startled and disgusted yelps speak for him.

The pain in his foot is coursing up his leg, but he pounds it into the ground regardless, because he looks back once more to see the man chasing him even closer than before. He turns back ahead in his panicked run only to stop short by bracing himself painfully with his bad leg and tumbles to the ground at the sight of a man standing in front of him. He's scampering to run before he can even completely land, because there's now two men chasing him and he's half certain he's going to die in the present by his past.

But suddenly there's a voice, loud and concerned, calling his name, his _real _name and it takes all he has to suppress his panic enough to see straight. He's not sure he's succeeded when the second man that has appeared looks exactly like Quill, but he says, "What's going on?," while stepping forward with his eyebrows furrowed enough that even Rocket can tell he's undoubtedly worried from six-hundred feet away.

Rocket can feel the harsh movement of oxygen against his windpipe as he struggles to breathe and knows he can't explain, and if he's totally honest with himself, he knows he doesn't want to. But then, the voice of the man chasing him sounds remarkably close as he calls, "They won't even be able to recognize you by the time we're done, vermin!," and Rocket does the only thing his frazzled brain can tell him to do. _Run to Quill._

He doesn't bother with looking where he's going anymore, because there's only one place that he needs and he thinks that if he loses sight of it, like everything else in life, it'll be gone too. So, whether he runs into someone's feet or they run over him, he doesn't give it another thought as he races for the only feet that matter.

He makes it. _Unbelievably so, _he thinks as he twists around Quill's left ankle, pulling and grasping for the bunched up material of the man's pant leg around his knee, because he's unable to do anything else in his frantic condition.

"Woah, woah! What's happening? What's wrong?"

Rocket sucks in oxygen like the first time he ever breathed in the fresh air after being created, and it grinds his ribs together so bad that he doesn't even realize his claws are digging into Quill's leg hard enough to bring blood until the man himself lets out a harsh curse of, "Shit, dude! What the hell?!," and tries to shake him off his limb.

Rocket retracts his claws and cowers in his panicked state, because Quill looks just like the man racing towards them with a forehead creased in anger and he starts to question whether or not his brain has deceived him. But the man trying to capture him suddenly stops in front of Quill with a harsh breath and points in his direction just to the side of Peter's leg.

"That thing is mine. It's coming with me," the man gasps and tightens his hold around the sack in his hand.

Rocket starts to stagger backwards, trying to find the strength to run even with the knowledge that he won't get very far in his shape lingering in the back of his terrorized mind. He's just about to turn when he hears Quill's angry voice again, but he does a double take that almost sends him to the ground when it's not directed at him.

"What did you just say?," and the question rolls off his tongue like thunder in a raging storm, low and threatening, and before he can even register what's happening, Quill moves one step to his left so that he's back to standing in front of Rocket and pushing the animal back up against his leg.

"I said, that _thing_-,"

"Okay, let me just stop you right there, because anything you say after that will only make me do something in front of all these people that I shouldn't do," Quill says and makes a show of his weapon on his hip. "Now, I'm willing to let you walk away without a scratch on you if you leave right now, and if my friend, Rocket, here agrees, but if he doesn't...well," Quill drops off and takes his weapon out, testing the weight of it in his hands for show.

The man stumbles back, arms outstretched defensively. "I'll go, I'll go!"

"Rocket?," Quill asks over his shoulder and uses his peripheral vision enough to see the raccoon nod his head.

Peter hesitates a moment before giving the man a go-ahead nod. He watches him go a few feet before lifting his blaster and shooting him in the leg. The man drops to the ground, writhing in pain, before Quill turns his attention to Rocket who still struggles to catch his breath with claws digging into Peter's flesh once more.

"Rocket? Hey," Peter squats down and gently removes the mammal from his leg while trying to see where his friend's unwavering gaze is directed. He checks over his shoulder, instantly seeing the distraction and shifts his squatted weight so he's blocking Rocket's site of the man who had chased him still contorting on the ground, "you with me, buddy?"

Rocket blinks and searches to find Quill's gaze before stumbling over his words. "Y-you said you'd let him go without a scratch."

"No," Quill shakes his head. "I said I'd let him walk away without a scratch and I did. He walked away unharmed, didn't he? Hey," Peter snaps his fingers in front of Rocket's face, because the animal is pulling at the fur around his face with clenched fists and gritted teeth, muttering inaudible things under his breath. "You alright?"

"Y-you shot him in leg!" Rocket protests, and suddenly he abandons pulling at his fur for searching Quill's face and it is every bit of the cowering expression Peter's trying desperately to forget from moments ago.

Peter notices the dark eyes tracing over his features in search of an expression of his own and it pains him to know that Rocket is looking for anger and ulterior motives , but he responds with, "After he walked away!," because he knows that a bickering argument is the best proof he can provide to say everything Rocket needs to hear.

"Why?"

"He hurt your leg," Quill points to the animal's injured limb, and before Rocket can wrap his head around the notion that Peter was defending him, he slowly takes the foot into his hands to inspect it.

"I stepped on a piece of glass," Rocket groans and has half a mind to scratch at Quill when he touches a particularly painful spot, but only manages to paw at him to get him to stop.

"Oh," Quill deadpans as he lets go of Rocket's leg. Then, "He hurt my leg?"

"I hurt your leg."

"Okay...because of him, you stepped on a piece of glass and hurt your leg, and then, punctured my leg. Therefore, I shot his leg."

"I don't even know why we're talking about this. Creep deserved it!," Rocket yelled around Quill, anger finally taking over the fear his mind had been hostage to, and Quill wants to smile at his success.

"Yeah, what was with that bitch anyway?"

"He was gonna- He..." the raccoon trails off, and if he steps closer to Quill, the man doesn't mention it, because he thinks that if he looks close enough he can see the past that haunts Rocket flicker in his eyes like an old picture show and he suddenly feels remarkably guilty for already watching too long.

"Well, he's not going to. I can assure you that," Quill grounds out as he chances a glance at the man still on the ground. He turns back to Rocket and says, "No one ever will," and damn, if it doesn't weigh on his shoulders to make such promises, but he's found out that the world is so much better when the only thing you're afraid of is losing the people that he carries it for.

"Hey, let's get out of here before Nova Corp shows up, huh?," he offers, and when Rocket looks at him with a bit of uncertainty, he smirks and says, "Come on, I can promise you that my shoulder is much more softer than Groot's."

He receives Rocket's patented glare and his famous eye roll that Peter claims as his job to bring out, before ushering him up his arm.

"If you tell anyone about this," Rocket mutters, "I'll make sure everybody knows about that Aaskavarian you slept with."

"I already mentioned that a long time ago in the Kyln," Quill responds as he starts to make his way towards Milano.

"No, no, no. Not that one. The _other_ one."

Peter abruptly stops. "How do you know about the other one?"

Rocket grins so wide that Peter feels his stomach twist. "I didn't. It was just a guess. Figured if you were stupid enough to do it once, you probably were stupid enough to do it again."

"How did we ever become friends?," Quill asks, but nudges the raccoon playfully in the side and he's just about to say something else when Rocket tugs on his ear hard enough to make him wince. "Ow! What was that for?"

"For being stupid enough to sleep with two Aaskavarians, let alone one," Rocket replies as he gives up tugging on Peter's ear to make purchase on his jacket to steady himself as Quill begins walking up the steps to Milano.

"One day, I'll explain my reasons and you'll get it. Hey, what were you doing before that guy tried to capture you anyway?"

Rocket wiggles a moment on Quill's shoulder as he reaches into the pocket on his uniform and pulls out a cassette tape.

Quill takes it from Rocket's extended hand and looks at it, "Redbone?"

He receives the closest thing to a grin he knows Rocket will give him, before he holds out a fist to the raccoon. It takes a bit of prompting, but eventually Rocket's fist meets his just in time for Gamora to appear at Milano's entrance and say, "I don't even want to know, but just don't get blood everywhere. I'm not cleaning it up this time."


End file.
